Ok so we missed this by a month, we’re sorry but what is time anyway. Maybe in this flat hot relentless July, we could use a little June Gloom! (Or as reader Michael McKee has heard it called in the Pacific Northwest, Juneuary.) The gloom can be pretty glorious, making the beginning of summer one […]
weather
Have you ever dialed a phone number to get the weather forecast? This is one of those questions and answers that dates you, like describing your favorite TV show in adolescence, or the brand of shoes that were extra cool in 10th grade. Dialing a number: There’s the first anachronism in that example. I don’t […]
Late summer makes me think of thunderstorms, baseball and Steve. This post first appeared in 2014. Last weekend there was an unseasonable lightning storm on the coast. Not here (thank goodness, for our dog’s sake), but farther south. More than 1,400 strikes touched down across the region, with 13 people reporting injuries in Los Angeles […]
Each June, I revisit a post about June Gloom, a weather phenomenon that turns much anticipated summer sunshine into foggy despair. You thought you were safe this year, but no! Our gloom was so deep it started in May and lasted all day, every day. Now it’s July, and there is light at the end […]
When I turned on my phone over the weekend after a blissful week without cell service, I got an increasingly alarming series of messages from friends at home. A fire broke out near where I’m dogsitting If I get evacuated can I bring the dogs I am going to text your mom I’m evacuating my […]
I’ve been a bit of a Facebook addict for years. The pictures of pets! The interesting articles! But, when stressful things are happening in the world, I find that Facebook mostly exists for me to soak up everyone else’s panic about current events, like a human anxiety sponge. During a particularly stressful week last month, […]
When Matt McCorkle was growing up in La Crosse, Wisconsin, his dad often listened to the automated broadcasts from the local NOAA weather station. “The soundscape of my childhood was that little weather robot,” McCorkle remembers. Now an audio engineer and sound designer, McCorkle has worked with musicians including John Legend and Laura Izibor, and was […]
It’s that time of year again: less than three weeks until the summer solstice, and I have pulled out my down vest, wool hat, scarf, and fuzzy boots. Yes, June Gloom is reduxing, as is this post, which originally appeared in 2012. But it’s not so bad. I love my fuzzy boots. ** I used […]